As of August 20, Oakland University has established a vaccine mandate for students living on campus in the fall and a mask mandate for students, staff and faculty regardless of vaccination status. In contrast to other public universities in the state like University of Michigan and Michigan State University, OU is not mandating vaccines for their campus community. The university is choosing instead to strongly recommending and encourage vaccination prior to the start of the fall semester.

On Thursday afternoon, I walked around campus and asked a few students the following question: Should OU mandate COVID-19 Vaccinations? Here are their responses.

Rebecca Schwartz, Major: Spanish K-12 education

“Well, I myself am vaccinated, so I’m fully in support of vaccines, but I think that it would be a really good idea because we’re all around each other so much and lots of the time in closed spaces and classrooms for a long amount of time. If we’re going to share that space I think we have a duty to protect each other and a vaccine mandate would help with that. Plus, other businesses and corporations, they’ve recently started passing vaccine mandates, so I think that it’s a good idea.”

Ryan Jones, Major: Biology

“I think it’s a personal choice. I took the vaccine myself, but I don’t think it should be forced upon anybody, but I think people should get it.”

Katherine Troy, Major: Human Resources Development

“For a vaccine mandate for campus, I think that whatever can get college back to whatever the new normal is, is the best way on how to keep people healthy and just keep moving with life, I think is the best decision. So, if that requires vaccine mandates, so masks don’t have to be worn, then that just has to be how it is. Although I’d like to people choose to get the vaccine on their own, or do what’s best for them, I think just getting back to normal and letting kids have a normal college experience, or students have a normal college experience as well as faculty is the best way to go.

Ross Mair, Major: Social Work with a specialization in Gerontology

“So, at the moment, I don’t mind too much. I definitely see why people do mind, however. I feel like at the end of the day, if it’s to keep our students safe, we’ve been wanting to keep students safe forever, so I figured that if it keeps students safe, then [we] might as well, I suppose.

Jalen Felix, Major: Nursing

“I wouldn’t have a problem with it. I’m already vaccinated, especially being in the nursing program. As far as I know, we’re supposed to be vaccinated for the nursing program, so I’d be okay with it.”